


Pumpkin Drama

by lumienarc



Series: Hauntober 2020 [1]
Category: Original Work
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-01
Updated: 2020-10-01
Packaged: 2021-03-07 18:14:06
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,108
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26751898
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lumienarc/pseuds/lumienarc
Summary: Entry for Hauntober 2020, prompt #1: Pumpkin
Series: Hauntober 2020 [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1948243
Kudos: 2





	Pumpkin Drama

The patch wasn’t functioned correctly, repeatedly her mother had warned. She was wrong, of course, because she did not know what they were doing to that patch, but she did not say anything against her mother. Autumn was around the corner and the harvest season had started. It would not be long until they must visit her parents. Annual visit, certainly, that was not pleasant to say the least. Her parents did not really understand farming, but they always gloated their skills and, shamefully very little, knowledge of harvest season. She knew all her life that her parents were fixated on it merely because they still held the record of largest pumpkin in the last twenty years. Now that she thought about the pumpkin… since her departure from home, her eyes had been evading all the pumpkins the villagers had grown on their respective fields all the way to where she was now, the marketplace. It was packed today since almost everyone had a good harvest and they were selling their produce quite aggressively.

“My pumpkin is going to win this year,” her neighbour Sam said proudly, patting the giant pumpkin by his side. It was enormous, as tall as Sam himself who was six foot three. She smiled, although inside she did not really care for the local yearly competition, and nodded courteously.

“I have not seen any contender to yours, Sam,” she assured.

“It’s good to know your husband doesn’t follow your parents’ path. I told them not to let him marry you. They would be proud if I were your husband instead with my boss pumpkin,” Sam replied, grinning.

“Oh, come now,” she protested as she rolled her eyes, “He did his best. Now I must go home to my husband. Good luck at the competition, Sam.” She picked the produce basket from Georgie, Sam’s employee, politely thanked her for the business. She shook her head subtly and walked quickly away from the stall.

“Now, now, there is no need to be mad. You know I was joking, don’t you?” Sam chased her, still grinning, but there was apparent hint of panic in his eyes. She was tired of him, so she kept her pace and ignored the farmer. If only he wasn’t the only one that managed to sell peaches in this village, really. “Now, come on! Live a little! All I wanted to do was to lighten up the mood! Why are you mad at me?”

He almost—so very close—touched her arm, but she manoeuvred, twirling gracefully just because she could, to avoid the physical contact. She stopped on her track and faced him, eyes firmly on his. It could be such a romantic scene if she did not wear her face solemn and eternally unimpressed.

“You made fun of my husband and you expected me to laugh? Now is the time you wish you had a brain of the size of our smallest pumpkin. Good afternoon, Sam. Goodbye.” She blinked at the end of her sentence, refreshing her mood instantly, and then quickly leaving the scene. Sam was gobsmacked, if not thoroughly destroyed inside. He did not have a chance to voice his mind because she, as light as autumn breeze, had reached the outside of the marketplace.

“You’re stupid,” Georgie said. “Mr. Rigel and Mrs. Fiona might be normal, but she… their daughter… She is an odd one, why even try hard to get her attention? She is going to jinx you.” He didn’t see how Sam was angered by the statement. He turned around, stomping back to where his beloved pumpkin was.

“You just don’t understand, dumbass. She won’t jinx me. Her husband might,” he muttered under his breath.

When it came to jinxing, indeed, Sam was not wrong at all. Cecilia, her name was, knew it was plain truth. Her husband, Cedric, received a curse for his eighth birthday. It was a series of unfortunate events that was not even funny. Cecilia did not know him back then. He lived across the country, beyond the great water. She had heard from him how miserable his life that bad luck always followed him since, and he did not even know why he received that curse in the first place. His parents disowned him for the sake of their own safety—he almost got them killed because his luck brought wildfire to their house although frankly it was winter—and he moved away from his country. Moving across the water was proven to help him get rid of his bad luck, but at a terrible cost. He exchanged his bad luck with powers that were beyond him.

The truth behind Cecilia’s parents’ champion pumpkin was that the first night Cedric arrived in the village, merely thirteen years old, he fell asleep in their pumpkin patch. His newly awakened powers accidentally made the pumpkins grow larger than ever. The largest pumpkin was as big as a cottage, an adult could make it a room for them if they wanted to. Cedric did make the largest pumpkin his room as a reward for enabling Cecilia’s parents. He didn’t understand it yet at that moment, but he was just thankful that they “accepted” him. The pumpkin room became an attraction instantly and he must leave the area bitterly during the day so people wouldn’t bother him.

Cecilia would sigh every single time she remembered the time her husband was struggling with his new life here. She sighed at the sight of her mother’s house, cosy and warm from outside, but what the eyes saw was so much different from what the scar felt. This was her first visit this year, and her heart was just heavy. She sighed again and then she knocked. Ten minutes was all it was needed to turn her heavy heart into solid lead.

“He was such a bright young man—he should have known better how to take care of the patch, Ceci. You grew up with me as your mother, why haven’t you told him what to do? You know how we did it. Be a champion and make us proud!” Fiona, again, repeated the same topic for the nth time. She slammed a hand at the table, and then emotionally tapped her finger on the wooden surface. “Your husband never goes out, no one knows about him. Ever since he arrived here, he always evades people. You must not be blinded. You go out to the village every day, he might be doing something behind your back!” Cecilia stopped her hands from cutting the peach for her mother. She put down the knife and the fruit.

“I will pretend that you did not say that to me just now, Mother,” she deadpanned. She leered darkly at Mr. Aberdeen that was snoring by the hearth, on his _favourite_ chair. Cecilia refused to acknowledge him by his first name. Which child would ever forget how their parents fell out of commitment right before their eyes?

“What was that supposed to mean?!” Fiona yelled. Cecilia stopped and then turned to her mother. Her eyes just spoke, “ _Pathetic_.”

“I will pretend that you did not just ask me that, Mother,” she said, resuming her fruit cutting once more. “I will try to persuade Cedric to come before Halloween.”

“Why don’t you two just spend Halloween with me here?”

“You know we don’t leave the house during Halloween, Mother. Now, eat your peach.”

Then, Cecilia made her leave as soon as her mother finished the peach she prepared. She left six peaches for her as usual. It was a promise that she would come back in six day time. Oftentimes, though, the promise was not able to be fulfilled. She walked down the paved street toward a ruddy path leading to a fancy cottage by the southern woods. Small cottage made of stones and sturdy iron woods, decorated with ivies and golden little bells. It didn’t make any sense, of course, but no one dared to steal any of those golden bells because Rigel Troyes would know and he would make them pay dearly for each stolen bell.

“Wallflower, darling, you come!” a small blond woman cheerfully welcomed her. She was in the garden, picking golden bells from bell flowers that grew in there. It was a strange sight, but Cecilia was used to it.

“Stop calling me that,” she said. “Is Father home?”

“Of course he is, please come in, make yourself at home,” the blond woman uttered. Her sickeningly sweet voice had Cecilia’s gag reflex triggered, but Cecilia was strong. She just rolled her eyes and then walked up to the door, opened it to find her father counting bells on the table.

“Father, how are you?” Cecilia asked out of courtesy. She put her basket at the kitchen table. She put six peaches on a bowl and brought one to cut. She placed a small plate on her father’s counting table, where there was very little space to squeeze in the plate, and then she sat and started peeling and cutting.

“I’m counting my bells, I’m fine as long as there is nothing missing!” Rigel answered without looking up. The bells were no bigger than a thimble each. They shone dimly under the warm lighting in the cottage. He put the bells he had counted in a hollowed pumpkin as always. Nothing was said afterward. Cecilia left the cut peach on the table and she stood up to leave. She did not spend more than ten minutes there.

When she was at the door, about to leave, her father spoke, “Is Cedric doing fine?”

It made her smile a little.

“Yes, Father.”

“Bring him here next time you visit.”

“I will try.”

“Make him,” Rigel said, now eyes fully trained on his daughter. He might have been weird since he mated with Mer, the little blond woman, but he sometimes still cared about other people more than he cared about the champion pumpkin—he actually had forgotten about it since…

“I will try, Father. Good night,” Cecilia said with a smile. She left and closed the door. Her smile dropped as she ran into Mer, almost literally.

“Leaving already?”

“Goodbye,” she evaded the question just as she evaded the woman.

“One day you will have to accept the truth, Wallflower!” Mer called out even though Cecilia speedily reached the path. Cecilia sighed again. She did not want to.

She walked north, right back to where she lived with her husband. There was orange smoke emitted from their chimney. Their house looked like a witch’s lair from afar, surrounded by patch that should be filled by pumpkins or other produce plants, but all they had were poisonous flowers and plants, fungi, and a wooden crate that never fell apart after left there for five years. She entered the house quietly, expecting chaotic living room, but it was just as neat as she left this morning.

“Dear, what is the smoke for?” she asked, looking for her husband that she assumed would be in the study as usual. She peeked into the study, which was underground. She didn’t hear an answer, but she heard his voice coming from there. She lifted the trap door and went downstairs.

“Dear?”

“Oh, goodness! Thank you, you came back in a perfect time!” Cedric, a tall, pale man with golden eyes, came running to her. He looked bewildered. Cecilia held his hands, surprisingly cold and sweaty. He must have been panicked for a while. “I… I think I did something horribly odd.”

“More than usual?”

“Yes, my love,” he choked an answer, tears welling up in his eyes. “Please, come and see. I don’t know what to do with this.” He led her toward the table he usually occupied to read books and write his research. It was supposed to be unoccupied since Cedric was standing with her, but there was someone sitting there. Someone… or something.

“Hello! Greetings! It’s a real pleasure to meet you!”

It was a kid, or at least it looked like a kid, probably aged seven to eight, dressed in black suit and dress shoes. The voice sounded like a boy, but Cecilia could not be so sure. It sounded and looked cheerful, very friendly, but anyone would scream at the sight. That strange kid… had a pumpkin for his head.

“I don’t have a name yet, but Dad said you can come up with one.”

“Dad?” Cecilia turned to her husband, who was mortified.

“I’m sorry,” he whispered. “It’s a pumpkin baby. Our pumpkin baby.” Cecilia turned her eyes back to the kid. This would be interesting…


End file.
